Thomas Ashby

“ ISCHIA (Gr. Πιθηκοῦσα, Lat. Aenaria, in poetry Inarime) , an island off the coast of Campania, Italy, 16 m. S.W. of Naples, to the province of which it belongs, and 7 m. S.W. of the Capo Miseno, the nearest point of the mainland. Pop. about 20,000. It is situated at the W. extremity of the Gulf of Naples, and is the largest island near Naples, measuring about 19 m. in circumference and 26 sq. m. in area. It belongs to the same volcanic system as the mainland near it, and the Monte Epomeo (anc. Ἐπωπεύς, viewpoint) , the highest point of the island (2588 ft.) ”

“ MEDIOLANUM, or Mediolanium (mod. Milan, q.v.) , an ancient city of Italy, and the most important in Gallia Transpadana. Livy attributes its foundation to the Galli Insubres under Bellovesus after their defeat of the Etruscans, in the time of the older Tarquin. According to other authorities, the Etruscan city of Melpum which preceded it was destroyed in 396 B.C. Objects of the Bronze age have been found outside the city on the south. ”

“ Between the amphitheatre and the theatre is the site of the Forum, of which nothing is now visible, and to the south on a projecting spur were tombs of the Roman period. There are also many remains of houses and villas. The citadel—which stood on the highest point an abrupt rock—was approached only on one side, that towards the city, and even here by a steep ascent of 150 ft. Upon it remains of the medieval castle, which stood here until 1191, alone are visible. The city walls, of which some remains still exist below the theatre, are built of blocks of the native “ lapis Albanus ” or peperino. ”

“ At the ninth mile the road crosses a ravine by the well-preserved and lofty Ponte di Nona, with seven arches, the finest ancient bridge in the neighbourhood of Rome. The line of the road is, considering the difficulty of the country beyond Gabii, very straight. ”

“ POPILIA (or Popillia) , VIA, the name of two ancient roads in Italy. (1) A highroad running from the Via Appia at Capua to Regium, a distance of 321 m. right along the length of the peninsula, and the main road through the interior of the country, not along the coast. It was built in 159 B.C. by the censor M. Popilius Laenias or in 132 B.C. by the consul P. Popilius. (2) A highroad from Ariminum to Aquileia along the Adriatic coast. It no doubt originally came into use when Aquileia was founded as a frontier fortress of Italy in 181 B.C., and Polybius gives the distance correctly as 178 m. ”

“ Like Ostia, Puteoli was considered a special port of Rome, and, on account of the safety and convenience of its harbour, it was preferred to Ostia for the landing of the more costly and delicate wares. ”

“ When Belisarius was sent by Justinian to recover Italy, Datius, the archbishop of Milan, joined him, and the Goths were expelled from the city. But Uraia, nephew of Vitigis the Gothic king, subsequently assaulted and retook the town, after a brave resistance. Uraia destroyed the whole of Milan in 539; and hence it is that this city, once so important a centre of Roman civilization, possesses so few remains of antiquity. Narses, in his campaigns against the Goths, had invited the Lombards to his aid. They came in a body under Alboin, their king, in 568, and were soon masters of north Italy. ”

“ There are no archaeological remains in Viterbo itself, except a few courses of masonry under the bridge which connects the cathedral with the city, near the cathedral, possibly the pier of an older bridge. But the site is not unreasonably considered to be ancient, and the name to be derived from Vetus urbs; tombs, too, have been found in the neighbourhood, and it is not an unlikely assumption that here, as elsewhere, the medieval town occupies the Etruscan site. ”

“ Even during the Social War Nuceria remained true to Rome, though the dependent towns joined the revolt; after it they were formed into independent communities, and Nuceria received the territory of Stabiae, which had been destroyed by Sulla in 89 B.C., as a compensation. In 73 B.C. it was plundered by Spartacus. Of the buildings of the ancient city nothing at all is to be seen; but on the hillsides on the S. are remains of villas of the Roman period, and here tombs have been found. ”

“ The former tribe had crossed the boundaries of the other two, and was ordered to withdraw immediately under pain of punishment (Corp. inscr. Lat. x. 7852) . Carales was the only city with Roman civic rights in Sardinia in Pliny’s time (when it received the privilege is unknown) and by far the most important place in the island; a Roman colony had been founded at Turris Libisonis (Porto Torres) and others, later on, at Usellis and Cornus.
We hear little of the island under the Empire, except as a granary and as remarkable for its unhealthiness and the audacity of its brigands. ”

“ OSTIA, an ancient town and harbour of Latium, Italy, at the mouth of the river Tiber on its left bank. It lies 14 m. S.W. from Rome by the Via Ostiensis, a road of very ancient origin still followed by a modern road which preserves some traces of the old pavement and remains of several ancient bridges. It was the first colony ever founded by Rome—according to the Romans themselves, by Ancus Martius—and took its name from its position at the mouth (ostium) of the river. ”

“ It is not, as a rule, possible to identify the various buildings, and the names which have been applied to the ruins are not authenticated. At Baiae itself there exist three large and lofty domed buildings, two octagonal, one circular, and all circular in the interior, of opus reticulatum and brick, which, though popularly called temples, are remains of baths or nymphaea. The Punta dell' Epitaffio also is covered with remains, while at Bacoli are several ruins—to the north of the village a small theatre, called the tomb of Agrippina; under the village the remains of a large villa ”

“ Of the ancient city walls a small fragment alone is preserved, and no other traces of antiquity are visible, not even of the amphitheatre which it once possessed, for which a ticket (tessera) has been found (Th. Mommsen in Ber. d. Sächsischen Gesellschaft d. Wissenschaften, 1849, 286) . It was a Volscian, not a Hernican, town; a part of its territory was taken from it about 306–303 B.C. by the Romans and sold. The town then became a praefectura, probably with the civitas sine suffragio, and later a colony, but we hear nothing important of it. It was situated just above the Via Latina. (T. As.) ”

“ During the imperial period little is recorded about Tusculum; but soon after the transference of the seat of empire to Constantinople it became a very important stronghold, and for some centuries its counts occupied a leading position in Rome and were specially influential in the selection of the popes. During the 12th century there were constant struggles between Rome and Tusculum, and towards the close of the century (1191) the Romans, supported by the German emperor, gained the upper hand, and the walls of Tusculum, together with the whole city, were destroyed. ”

“ Remains of many other Roman buildings also exist beneath the modern town, among the best preserved of which may be noted the public baths (Thermae Achilleae) under the cathedral, and those under the church of S. Maria dell’ Indirizzo. The number of baths is remarkable, and gives some idea of the luxury of the place in Roman times. Their excellent preservation is accounted for by their burial under the lava. The majority were excavated by Prince Ignazio Biscari (1719–1786) , who formed an important private collection of antiquities. Of the ancient city walls no authenticated remains exist. ”

“ The foundation of Locri goes back to about 683 B.C. It was the first of all Greek communities to have a written code of laws given by Zaleucus in 664 B.C. From Locri were founded the colonies of Meisma and Heiponium (Hipponium) . It succeeded in repelling the attacks of Croton (battle on the river Sagras, perhaps sometime in the 6th century) , and found in Syracuse a support against Rhegium: it was thus an active adversary of Athenian aggrandisement in the west. Pindar extolls its uprightness and love of the heroic muse of beauty, of wisdom, and of war, in the 10th and 11th Olympian Odes. ”

“ It was an ancient Volscian town, a member of the Latin league of 499 B.C., which became a Latin colony in 382 B.C., and, owing to the strength of its position as a frontier fortress, is frequently mentioned in the military history of Rome up to the time of Sulla, by whom it was captured in 82 B.C. Under the empire it was well known for its wine, which Augustus preferred even to Falernian. Considerable remains of the city walls exist, built of large blocks of limestone in the polygonal style. ”

“ The cathedral, completed in 1319, has a good Gothic façade; the interior has to some extent been spoilt by later restoration. The campanile rests upon a Gothic arch erected in 1451. The Palazzo Comunale has a courtyard of the 16th century. That the ancient town (which is close to the modern) existed before the Roman supremacy had extended so far is proved by the coins. It lay in the 2nd Augustan region (Apulia) , but the people belonged to the Frentani by race. Its strong position gave it importance in the military history of Italy from the Hannibalic wars onwards. ”

“ There are many modern public monuments—considerably more than in other Italian towns—and some of them are fine. The Mole Antonelliana, built by Alessandro Antonelli, is the most important example of modern architecture in Turin. It belongs to the municipality, and is used for the Risorgimento Museum. It is the highest brick edifice in Europe, its summit being 510 ft. above ground. It is a square edifice with a large dome and lofty spire, the dome being raised upon a hall with three galleries, one above the other, so that from the floor to the top of the dome is over 300 ft. ”

“ We note a little later the existence of merchants of Puteoli in the East. Under the empire we find Eastern cults taking root here sooner than in Rome. The construction of the harbour of Claudius at the mouth of the Tiber adversely affected Puteoli. Nero's scheme for the construction of a canal from Lake Avernus to Ostia would have restored the balance in its favour (though it certainly could not have been continuous all the way to Rome with the means of engineering then available) .
The corn supply of Rome came partly through Puteoli, partly through Ostia. ”

“ There are many other modern villas, and the sheltered hillsides (for the mountains rise abruptly behind the town) are covered with lemon, orange and pomegranate gardens. The now deserted promontory of the Monte Scauri to the E. is also covered with remains of ancient villas; the hill is crowned by a large tomb, known as Torre Giano. To the E. at Scauri is a large villa with substructions in “Cyclopean” work. The ancient Formiae was, according to the legend, the home of the Laestrygones, and later a Spartan colony (Ὁρμίαιδιὰ τὸ εὔορμον, Strabo v. 3. 6, p. 233) . ”

“ For magnificence and luxury the Sybarites were proverbial throughout Greece, and in the 6th century probably no Hellenic city could compare with its wealth and splendour. At length contests between the democrats and oligarchs, in which many of the latter were expelled and took refuge at Crotona, led to a war with that city, and the Crotoniats with very inferior forces were completely victorious. ”